Loving as Christ Loves Me: An Astonishing Truth

As a follow-up to Monday's post on New Covenant living, I would like to point out an excellent comment given by my father in yesterday's comment stream. The premise of my post Monday was that New Covenant believers are known for our obedience to a "new" commandment from Jesus to "love one another." My father points out just exactly how this commandment in John 13:34 is "new."

The law of "Loving your neighbor as yourself" was the old law given in the Old Covenant as recorded various places including Lev. 19:18. When Jesus said "A new commandment give I you..." [John 13:34] He was NOT giving a new commandment to love, which was already given, but rather (He was giving a new commandment in) HOW to love someone --- " As I have loved you." [Not as you love yourself.]

Think about what Jesus is saying. We have always been commanded to love others - from the very beginning. But in the New Covenant our standard or measurement of loving others is no longer "love people like I love myself," but rather, "love people as Christ has loved me."

The question one should ponder as we think about how we are to love others is clear: How is the love of Christ for my soul different than my own love for my own soul? There many, major differences between self-love and Christ's love for me. But there is one major difference I would like to point out in today's post.

Self-love is powerful and deep - but expected; Christ's love for me is so much more powerful, so much deeper - and unexpected! Thus, my love for others in the New Covenant ought to astonish, amaze and cause people to scratch their head in wonderment and surprise - just as I am astonished, amazed and surprised by Christ's love for me.

Psychologists tell us that self-love is universal. Even those with "low self-esteem" love themselves - or they wouldn't be bothered by whatever problems they perceive they have. Again, self-love is easily understood and explained.

But Christ's love for me hard to explain and understand. His love is so much stronger, and so much more powerful - and unexpected!. Thus, loving people the way Christ loved me is so much deeper, stronger and incredibly more powerful than we imagine. It is also surprising to those being loved! In other words, New Covenant love for others is "astonishing," just as Christ's love for me astonishes me!

Could it be the reason there is so little love among Christians today is because we have ceased to be astonished at Christ's love for us?

Too often we pastors and church leaders want to focus people on "their love for God," but when I read the Scriptures and the prayers of the apostles, their concern was not so much that believers increase in their love for God as it was that believers grow in their comprehension of God's love for them.

"For this reason I bow my knees before the Father . . . that you may have the strength to comprehend . . . and know the love of Christ which surpasses your knowledge" (Ephesians 3:14, 18-19)

Could we with ink the ocean fill,
And were the skies of parchment made,
Were every stalk on earth a quill,
And every man a scribe by trade,
To write the love of God above,
Would drain the ocean dry.
Nor could the scroll contain the whole,
Though stretched from sky to sky.

When we become more and more amazed at Christ's love for us, we then begin to understand that loving people in the New Covenant way is to surprise them with our love as we are surprised by God with His love for us.

In His Grace,

Wade

The New Covenant: Christian Living at It's Finest

One of the best things we can do for others is to teach and model the New Covenant. The word "covenant" in Hebrew is [beriyth], and in Greek it is [diatheke], often translated "testament." Both original words literally mean "a promise or solemn oath" (See Genesis 26:3). We help others when they hear us teach, and they see us live, resting in God's solemn promise of faithful goodness toward us - regardless of our performance, obedience or commitment.

In order for Christians to understand this radical way of thinking and living, they must first understand that there two kinds of covenants God enters into as described by Scripture. First, God has often entered into covenants that are based on a mutual agreement, so that God makes a promise to bless based upon certain requirements being met by the recepient of the promise. But there is a second kind of covenant or "promise" that God enters into, and fulfills, with no requirements or necessary stipulations from the recepient of the promise. This kind of covenant is called "an unconditional covenant." Unconditional covenants are entered into because of the mere grace of the promise maker.

Though there are several conditional covenants that God has made with His people throughout history as recorded in the Old Testament, there is one major conditional covenant, under which all other conditional covenants were made. The writer of Hebrews officially calls this covenant that God initiated with His people "The Old Covenant." God said, "If you will obey me . . . then I will bless you. If you disobey me, then I will curse you," and all Israel agreed. But the writer of Hebrews tells us that this covenant has been done away with and replaced with a "New Covenant" (Hebrews 9:15) between God and both Jews and Gentiles - all who will trust His Son. This "New Covenant" is a "better" covenant with "better" promises; promises that are unconditional in nature.

A believer in Jesus Christ is the recepient of promises from God that are based on His mere grace, and have nothing to do with the performance or commitment of the participants. Simply "look to Christ and live." Unfortunately, many pastors do harm to their congregations by not understanding themselves the differences between the two covenants. A New Covenant preacher will tell God's people what God has done for us through His Son, our Saviour Jesus Christ. New covenant messages and ministries will not be on "if you will . . . then God will . . . " but rather, "look what God has promised to do, and will do, for those who trust Him." It is to this ministry, with this message, that Jesus has called all minister to others the good news.

But our High Priest [Jesus Christ] has been given a ministry that is far superior to the ministry of those who serve under the old laws, for he is the one who guarantees for us a better covenant with God, based on better promises. If the first covenant had been faultless, there would have been no need for a second covenant to replace it. But God himself found fault with the old one when he said: “The day will come, says the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the people of Israel and Judah…” (Heb. 8:6-8 NLT)

I was once asked why our church did not have an active "Promise Keepers" movement within it, and I responded that when emphasis is on "The Promise Keeper," meaning God, then we would be involved. I have found that when ministries are built on the promises of man, they always tend to fail in the end.

However, it is not my desire to focus on the specifics of how a ministry implements New Covenant teaching in terms of tithing, church attendance, Christian commitment, etc . . . There are plenty of web sites that delve into this, including several articles by my own father, Paul Burleson.

The purpose of this particular post is to simply show that under the New Covenant there is a particular characteristic that defines God's people. We are not defined by our "obedience to any law" such as the law of Sabbath keeping, or the law of sacrifice, or the law of Temple worship, or the law of abstinence, or any other Old Covenant law, church law, or man-made law. Rather, we are defined as a people by our desire to solely and completely fulfill one law - the law from Jesus Christ Himself, called "the royal law of love."

Jesus calls this His "new commandment" (John 13:39). It is "new" in that it is a "new" commandment for the "new" man whose been given a "new" name and sings a "new" song as he lives a "new" life where all things are "new" (Rev. 21:5). It is this radical commandment to love one another - to boldly, liberally and continually love people - that is THE IDENTIFYING MARK of God's people. This does not mean that a New Covenant believer cannot be a person of strong convictions,,, but it does mean that love for people is to pervade all he/she does.

One of the best ways to measure whether or not we are living the Christian life to its fullest and its finest is to measure whether our hearts are truly filled with love for people - people who disagree with us, people who are different than us, people who are a delight to us. Do we rejoice when others are blessed? Are we glad when others succeed? Do we do what we do because we love?

These are questions I ask myself almost daily.

In His Grace,


Wade Burleson

Has the Ark of the Covenant Truly Been Found?

In a copyrighted story from the Italian news agency Adnkronos the patriarch of the Orthodox Church of Ethiopia, Abuna Paulos (pictured here) says he will announce to the world today, Friday, June 26, the unveiling of the Ark of the Covenant, perhaps the world’s most prized archaeological and spiritual artifact. The patriarch says the ark has been hidden away in a church in his country for several thousand years.

Abuna Pauolos, in Italy for a meeting with Pope Benedict XVI this week, told the news agency, “Soon the world will be able to admire the Ark of the Covenant described in the Bible as the container of the tablets of the law that God delivered to Moses and the center of searches and studies for centuries.”

The announcement is expected to be made at 2 p.m. Italian time from the Hotel Aldrovandi in Rome. Pauolos will reportedly be accompanied by Prince Aklile Berhan Makonnen Haile Sellassie and Duke Amedeo D’Acosta.

“The Ark of the Covenant is in Ethiopia for many centuries,” said Pauolos. “As a patriarch I have seen it with my own eyes and only few highly qualified persons could do the same, until now.”

According to Pauolos, the actual Ark has been kept in one church, but to defend the treasure, a copy was placed in every single church in Ethiopia.

He said a museum is being built in Axum, Ethiopia, where the Ark will be displayed. A foundation of D’Acosta will fund the project.

The Ark of the Covenant is the sacred container of the Ten Commandments as well as Aaron’s rod and a sample of manna, the mysterious food that kept the Israelites alive while wandering in the wilderness during their journey to the promised land.
Muslim scholars say it will be found near the end of times by the Mahdi – a messianic figure in Islam.

I happen to be a partial-preterist, ala R.C. Sproul, but many on my pastoral staff who are dispensationalist, including Pastor Ted Kuschel, Th.M, Dallas Theological Seminary, will most assuredly point out to me the prophetic significance of this event when I arrive in Enid the first of next week.

I remain a skeptic on matters like this.

In His Grace,

Wade

The Confusing Future Direction of the SBC

Tuesday night at the 2009 Southern Baptist Convention, the messengers overwhelmingly voted to adopt a motion from Al Mohler to "authorize the President of the Southern Baptist Convention to appoint a Great Commission Taskforce charged to bring a report and any recommendations to the SBC meeting in Orlando, Florida June 15-16, 2010 concerning how Southern Baptists can work together more faithfully and effectively in serving Christ through the Great Commission."

The Convention in Orlando next year is setting up to be a doozy. Not only will there be a new President elected, but the report of this Great Commission Taskforce will be as controversial as the Peace Committee Report of the mid-1990's.

There are three reasons why this Great Commission vote Tuesday night launches a year of controversy:

(1). Baptist State Convention Executive-Directors and Dr. Morris Chapman are united in their belief that certain agency heads, particularly Jerry Rankin, Al Mohler and Danny Akin are looking for churches to give more money directly to their institutions rather than through the Cooperative Program where state conventions and the Executive Committee would receive a cut of what is given. Whether this is true or not is not really the issue - it is the perception.

(2). Some Southern Baptists, particularly Paige Patterson, Malcolm Yarnell and others affiliated with Southwestern Theological Seminary believe the Great Commission Resurgence Declaration does not go far enough doctrinally. Wanting a much firmer and official "Baptist Identity" spelled out in the Great Commission Declaration, Baptist Identity adherents have signed the document with "caveats" or not signed it at all. Many who argued against the Great Commission Recommendation Tuesday night said the growing influence of Calvinism in the SBC is the reason for the decline in baptisms, and no Great Commission Declaration would ever weed out what really needs to go in the SBC - Calvinists.

(3). Dr. Morris Chapman made, in my opinion, a very strategic mistake during his Executive-Director's address Tuesday morning. As stated above, Dr. Chapman is adamantly opposed to the Great Commission Declaration because of a feeling those in support of it will work to "cut out" traditional Cooperative Program accounting. In essence, Dr. Chapman believes Danny Aiken and other agency heads have long sought the Convention to label any DIRECT gifts to any specific SBC agency as "Cooperative Program" giving. Dr. Chapman takes the position regarding the Cooperative Program budget that most local SBC pastors take regarding their local church budgets. Once people begin to "designate" gifts then the idea of a unified and cooperative budget goes out the window.

However, rather than addressing the practical and financial concerns associated with GCRD Article 9 (i.e. the restucturing of SBC agencies and ministries) during his address, Dr. Chapman delivered a rather polemical strike against Calvinism. Dr. Chapman, in essence, blamed Calvinism for the decline of baptisms, giving and missions in the SBC. Several who opposed the Great Commission Recommendation Tuesday night picked up on Dr. Chapman's attack against Calvinism. Dr. Chapman's strike against Calvinists in the SBC was a mistake.

In an extraordinary luncheon meeting at Sojourn Church after Dr. Morris Chapman's address, Dr. Danny Aiken publicly apologized to all his "Calvinist" friends present at the luncheon (Dr. Mohler was seated to his left on the platform) for the "shameful" misrepresentations of Calvinism by Executive-Director Morris Chapman. I don't know when I've seen agency heads at such odds with each other as they seem to now be.

My Vote on the Great Commission Resurgence

In the end, I voted for the Great Commission Recommendation Tuesday night. Honestly, after the Baptist21 luncheon today at Sojourn where national agency leaders seemed to either advocate or condone bypassing state conventions in order to give directly seminaries, the IMB, or other national entities of the SBC, I was withdrawing my support for the Great Commission Resurgence Declaration.

However, after hearing the floor debate on Tuesday night and realizing that those voting AGAINST the Great Commisison recommendation were either slamming Calvinists, or opposing evangelical cooperation, or were strong advocates of Baptist Identity - I voted FOR the Great Commission Motion.

I admire Dr. Chapman, but I think it was a very strategic mistake to oppose the Great Commission Resurgence on the basis of blaming Calvinists for the problems in the SBC. Others heard his address and picked up the mantra Tuesday night during the debate on the Great Commission recommendation. In the end, the diatribe against Calvinists by those opposing the GCRD Task Force is precisely why I voted FOR for the GCRD Task Force.

Otherwise, I probably would have voted against it. It is not my desire, nor will it ever by my desire, to defund state missions ministry. I can't speak for other Baptist state conventions, but I can guarantee you that the work done in Oklahoma is extraordinary. Frankly, I am far more comfortable with the accountability of how our STATE Cooperative Program funds are being spent than I am with the accountability of hour our NATIONAL Cooperative Program funds are being spent - particularly when our national convention refuses to adopt GAAP or FASB conflict of interest guidelines - something our state Baptist Conention did years ago.

Needless to say, things are getting very confusing in the SBC. I told my wife three years ago that the reason I was taking a stand against excluding charismatics from the IMB and the SBC is because if you don't draw the line there, then those who hold to the doctrines of grace would be the next ones targeted.

Well, it sure seems that some very signficant people are now taking direct aim at Calvinists in the SBC.

Hold on tight. It could get really rocky.

In His Grace,

Wade Burleson

A Black Mesa Moment of Reflection

On Monday, June 8, 2009 I did something I had wanted to do for a long, long time. I hiked up Black Mesa to the highest elevation in Oklahoma - 4,972.9 feet above sea level, a football field under one mile high. The Black Mesa was formed by lava flow from ancient volcanoes in the Colorado Rockies - an ancient lava flow easily seen in the map above. The Black Mesa was created by this lava flow and is like a table top sitting high above the plains. Black Mesa is as far west and as far north as you can go in the state of Oklahoma.

People think Enid, Oklahoma (Garfield County) is in far northwest Oklahoma - not even close. At 7:30 a.m. I hopped in my trusty 140,000 mile Honda Accord and headed west on US Highway 412 out of Enid. I went through Woodward (90 miles), through Guyman, Oklahoma, (210 miles), then to Boise City, Oklahoma (275 miles). In Boise City you go on a circle around the courthouse in the center of town and then follow State Highway 325 west 37 miles to the city limits of Kenton, Oklahoma. Just outside the city limits of Kenton, which necessitated me turning my watch back since Kenton is the only town in Oklahoma that operates on Mountain Time, I turned north and followed a county road 4 miles to the parking lot of the Black Mesa Natural Preserve. Distance from Enid - 312 miles.

At the Natural Preserve you must park your car and then hike 4.2 miles to the top of Black Mesa. On this day I was the only hiker. I never saw another human being during the almost 10 mile round trip hike. The sounds of the land were incredible. From the locusts nesting in the thousands of cacti, to the dozens of different birds, as well as the whistling winds sweeping down the gorges, it was a cacophony of sounds and sights the nearly two hours it took me to get to the top.

But my, was it worth it.

Black Mesa is in the far northwestern corner of Cimarron County, the most western county in the Panhandle of Oklahoma. Cimarron County has the distinction of being the only county in the United States touched by four different states. As I sat and rested on top of Black Mesa, I could literally see 1/10 of the United States in terms of our states.

Less than fourteen hundred feet to my west was the state of New Mexico. On the horizon I could see the mountains surrounding Raton Pass. To my north four miles was Colorado and the ancient volcanic mountains at the foot hills of the Colorado Rockies, the very volcanoes which provided the lava that formed Black Mesa. Back to my northwest was Kansas; to the south was Texas, and due east was the great state of Oklahoma. From my viewpoint a mile above the earth I could see over a hundred miles in each direciton.

But there was something that happened while I was on the top of Black Mesa that got me to thinking. It was a bright, sunny day and as looked at the beautiful blue skies I saw a passenger jet flying east to west above me. They say at night the stars kiss your nose on Black Mesa, and I can vouch that in the day the planes are close as well. I could clearly see the plume of smoke coming out of the twin engines of the jet, with the long, white crystallized cloud it formed as it crossed the blue sky. I thought about the couple of hundred passengers on their way to Los Angeles or beyond. Then I looked down and saw a Burlington Northern - Santa Fe train snaking its way, heading west. Beside the train was a modern state highway where a few cars were heading west as well.

Just to the south of the railroad tracks and highway, easily seen from my position on Black Mesa, was the path of the Old Santa Fe Trail. from 1823 to 1880 the Cimarron Cutoff of the Sante Fe trail crossed the Oklahoma Panhandle just to the south of where I sat, heading west into Mexico and Santa Fe (a city once in Mexico but now in the US's "New Mexico"). The United States in the 1820's were very interested in establishing trade with the new country of Mexico and so a trail was forged from St. Louis to Santa Fe - a wagon trail. At Dodge City (Kansas) the trail split into a southern route (the Cimarron Cutoff ), which crossed the just south of the Black Mesa, and a northern route that took the trail west through the Colorado Rockies and then south to Santa Fe. Most travellers and traders in the 1800's took the Cimarron Cutoff of the Santa Fe trail because it was 100 miles shorter and avoided the Rockie Mountains.

With the advent of the steam engine and the railroad, the Santa Fe trail fell into disuse in the 1880's. No longer would people make the seven week journey from St. Louis to Santa Fe via wagon. They would take the train. Then, just a few decades later, people were taking cars and planes to Santa Fe and beyond.

As I was thinking about all this, I pulled out my Blackberry Curve and saw I had missed a couple of calls.

And then it hit me.

If I were a business on the east coast wanting to trade with merchants and people in Santa Fe, how foolish would I be to keep bringing my goods in a wagon over the Santa Fe Trail? Not only would I be foolish - I'd be out of business. Times have changed. The world has become fast paced. Communication is instant. From my perspective on Black Mesa, a mile high, I could see this very clearly.

Why then, do we Southern Baptists continue to use an archaic system of governance that was established in 1845 - the very time the Sante Fe trail was being used to bring goods to, and communicate with, the people of Mexico?

Isn't it about time we started having our Convention regionally, electronically and efficiently? My wife and I just spent $2,000 hard earned dollars to buy our tickets, hotel and car to Louisville, Kentucky. I spent the weekend with a church planter from Arizona who not only couldn't afford to go to Louisville, if he could, he would use his money to attend conferences that would help him in his church planting ministry.

I asked him, however, if the Convention offered a regional Convention, via satellite, that would allow him to observe, participate and vote, would he attend - say if one of the regional conventions were in Phoenix?

Absolutely! He responded.

It's time the Southern Baptist Convention caught up with the rest of the world. It's time we stopped using our archaic system of governance that excludes the vast majority of Southern Baptists from being able to participate in Convention business.

It's time we changed how we operate.

In His Grace,

Wade

Better to Get Theology from Scripture, not Songs

Yesterday I presided over a funeral of a man who died at the age of fifty nine from pancreatic cancer. The family picked out some great songs to have sung at the funeral including Chris Tomlin's Amazing Grace: My Chains Are Gone. We have sung this song often in our corporate worship at Emmanuel, and though I enjoy it immensely, the last verse has always bothered me because of its poor, though popular, theology. To me, this song is an illustration of how we should be careful that the theology we believe comes from the inspired text of Scripture and not necessarily the songs we sing. The words of the last verse of Chris Tomlin's version of Amazing Grace are as follows:

The earth shall soon dissolve like snow;
the sun forbear to shine.
But God who called me here below,
will be forever mine.

The Scripture, however, tells us the earth doesn't dissolve; it is redeemed by God and endures forever. "A generation goes, and a generation comes, but the earth remains forever" (Ecclesiastes 1:4). “Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth” (Matthew 5:5). “The righteous themselves will inherit the earth, and they will reside upon it forever” (Psalm 37:29).

“The redeemed earth will last, not just for a thousand years, but forever” writes Anthony Hoekema. The grandeur of the Grand Canyon, the pearl green waters of the Caribbean, the white sand beaches of the Pacific, and the lush green forests will all be a part of our heaven, without sin and corruption according to Randy Alcorn in his book aptly entitled "Heaven."

“The whole creation groans and travails awaiting the redemption” (Romans 8:22). When Jesus ushers in eternity, the earth will be renewed, and our God will inhabit it with His people. “Christians often talk about living with God ‘in heaven’ forever,” writes theologian Wayne Gruden. “But in fact the biblical teaching is richer than that; it tells us that there will be new heavens and a new earth – an entirely renewed creation – and we will live with God there…There will also be a new kind of unification of heaven and earth… There will be a joining of heaven and earth in this new creation.”

But someone might object that Jesus “left earth” to prepare a place to which we will go (John 14) What is this place? “I saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down from God out of heaven, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband” (Revelation 21:2).

Heaven and a renewed earth will unite for our eternal home when the curse is reversed, and we will enjoy all of God's created universe. The resurrection is nothing more, nothing less, than God's redeemed people being raised from the dead to inherit a redeemed and restored earth.

So, the last verse of Chris Tomlin's version of Newton's original might could better be sung like this:

The earth shall be redeemed by God;
the sun will forever shine.
And God who called me here below,
will be forever mine.

In His Grace,


Wade